New Armor set: Protective Armor

[Megajoule]

2 hours ago, Puma said:

Not at all. The point is, if you argue that "there are enough armor sets already" then you're ALSO discounting any new blast sets, buff sets, melee sets, etc.

And I have.  If you'll check some of the other threads in this forum, I'm consistently against "new powersets for their own sake" of all types, not just defense.  This is just one of the latest examples.

 

Quote

Like it or not, for many people, trying out new sets is part of the fun.  I've rolled over 200 characters, gotten most of them to 50.  So yes, I've had an Energy Aura brute whose concept was explained as using a suit of high tech armor.  I would put money down that I've been AT LEAST as creative as you in explaining away how powers work on my toons, and in finding creative new explanations to get the concept I want.

It's been shown again and again in MMOs that devs cannot reasonably be expected to produce new content at the rate that players consume it.  This is just as true of new, balanced abilities (classes, powersets, etc etc) as it is of story arcs/chapters, raids and trials, etc.  When they lag behind, people complain they are bored; when they rush to push things out, the product is usually of inferior quality.  And we're dealing with a small team of volunteers here, not paid employees.

 

Some of the threads here and in the Beta forums are struggling to balance powersets that were in the game when it closed, or all the way back to launch, and which have already been talked about for years.  If this idea - ill-advised though I think it is at its very core - were to be greenlit tomorrow, I doubt you'd see anything on Test before the end of the year, or in a "final" (ha ha) release before the middle of the next.  What will you do until then?

 

tl;dr (again):  if you're relying on new powers to satisfy your craving for novelty, you will be disappointed, the game will suffer, or both.

IMO, of course.

 

Edited October 21, 2019 by Megajoule

[Leogunner]

The "lots of passives" concept for an armor set...ah, that brings me back.  I remember suggesting something with that gimmick a long while back.  Although my concept was extremely niche, that is to use it's mez protection, it required you get mezzed (it only had knockback protection under normal circumstances) but when you get mezzed, you actually grew more defensive rather than your armor detoggling (back when getting mezzed dropped your toggles) and it had a breakfree variant with a short cooldown that, when used while mezzed, cast that mez on all foes around you.  I could even imagine there being a tier 9 that would either rez you, if you drop below 0HP it would bring you back to full and cast a self hold that you can then reflect onto foes around you.

 

It was a sort of Psi Armor variant but if I were reconceptualizing it, maybe something like Reality Anchor Aura or Mirror Aura.

 

That being said, a variation of Ninjutsu that is a more balanced for defense and resistance wouldn't be a bad variation.  Although having your mez protection be also a click heal feels off...like you probably couldn't capitalize on that part if you're constantly keeping your mez protection up.  I'd suggest converting that healing into +regen or absorb or +max HP.  Something others seem to ignore is that the set's Tier 9 is very useful for offense.  Depending on how effective the +rech and +dmg is might end up shifting this to being a favored set for IO builds.  Having less effective mitigation in a SO build but higher utility in IO builds is something that shouldn't be looked over.

[Puma]

4 hours ago, Megajoule said:

And I have.  If you'll check some of the other threads in this forum, I'm consistently against "new powersets for their own sake" of all types, not just defense.  This is just one of the latest examples.

 

It's been shown again and again in MMOs that devs cannot reasonably be expected to produce new content at the rate that players consume it.  This is just as true of new, balanced abilities (classes, powersets, etc etc) as it is of story arcs/chapters, raids and trials, etc.  When they lag behind, people complain they are bored; when they rush to push things out, the product is usually of inferior quality.  And we're dealing with a small team of volunteers here, not paid employees.

 

Some of the threads here and in the Beta forums are struggling to balance powersets that were in the game when it closed, or all the way back to launch, and which have already been talked about for years.  If this idea - ill-advised though I think it is at its very core - were to be greenlit tomorrow, I doubt you'd see anything on Test before the end of the year, or in a "final" (ha ha) release before the middle of the next.  What will you do until then?

 

tl;dr (again):  if you're relying on new powers to satisfy your craving for novelty, you will be disappointed, the game will suffer, or both.

IMO, of course.

 

Yeah we'll deeply disagree here.  I actually feel like you just made my case for me. 

Players will consume new content/raids/missions quickly.   You know what takes longer to consume?

Running entirely new toons to level 50 through all of the content.  The one thing CoH did RIGHT versus other MMOs is consistently come out with new power sets that let players make -multiple- new toons to run through all of the same content and have it feel different.  Altitis in this game is beyond any other MMO for a reason. And it's a good reason, even if it isnt your personal play style. 

And you're creating a false choice:  lag behind or rush things out.    I don't see anywhere in this thread where -anyone- has demanded a certain timeline.  And this small band of devs have already shown the ability to create new powersets, port over existing ones to new classes (time and plant for blasters, etc.), and modify other sets (energy melee).  Heck, they even created an entirely new archetype...though I think it needs some loving. In that same time they've only added a couple of contacts, and a single TF/Raid event.  Adding new contacts and missions is not easy. At all.  And they get burned through much faster than entirely new characters.  New toons are pretty much why I keep playing the game even though it's been out for 15 years and I've run everything it offers multiple times.  


tl;dr: Investing in new powersets is the cheapest way to keep the game alive and fresh and maintain the player base. 

[Steampunkette]

2 hours ago, Puma said:

Yeah we'll deeply disagree here.  I actually feel like you just made my case for me. 

Players will consume new content/raids/missions quickly.   You know what takes longer to consume?

Running entirely new toons to level 50 through all of the content.  The one thing CoH did RIGHT versus other MMOs is consistently come out with new power sets that let players make -multiple- new toons to run through all of the same content and have it feel different.  Altitis in this game is beyond any other MMO for a reason. And it's a good reason, even if it isnt your personal play style. 

And you're creating a false choice:  lag behind or rush things out.    I don't see anywhere in this thread where -anyone- has demanded a certain timeline.  And this small band of devs have already shown the ability to create new powersets, port over existing ones to new classes (time and plant for blasters, etc.), and modify other sets (energy melee).  Heck, they even created an entirely new archetype...though I think it needs some loving. In that same time they've only added a couple of contacts, and a single TF/Raid event.  Adding new contacts and missions is not easy. At all.  And they get burned through much faster than entirely new characters.  New toons are pretty much why I keep playing the game even though it's been out for 15 years and I've run everything it offers multiple times.  


tl;dr: Investing in new powersets is the cheapest way to keep the game alive and fresh and maintain the player base. 

Making new missions is the cheapest 'cause you've got a ton of people willing to write endless stories just for the sake of seeing their work become a part of the game they love. Taking AE Arcs that the playerbase has reviewed and tying them to in-world contacts and mission doors takes a lot less effort than building a powerset.

 

A powerset needs:

Data Entry for Each Power Individually (Which is not copy-paste)

UI Changes to accomodate the new powerset in the appropriate archetype lists

Icons and Descriptions

Animations

FX 

Balance Passes

[MetaVileTerror]

And all of that work?  

 

Is.

Absolutely.

Worth.

It.

[Megajoule]

Yes, you can half-ass a (potentially) broken, imbalanced, untested powersets much quicker than the timetable I gave.

Should we?  IMO, no.

I've seen plenty of content (including new features and systems) released in that state, without any significant testing (or the advice of the testers ignored), that never gets fixed or even looked at.  Sometimes it eventually gets removed from the game, but most of the time it just hangs around, with older players warning newcomers not to go near the land mines.

(I could point to several examples in STO, but I don't have to, when the Shadow Shard is right over there... not that you'd know, if it wasn't this month's WST.)

 

Oh, and I thought of something today I wanted to make clear.  This is in no way personal, I have nothing against you, and your proposal is not significantly worse than all the other half-baked ideas for new powers and ATs I've seen posted here.  You just happened to be the (un)lucky one I decided to make an (extended) example of. 😕

Edited October 21, 2019 by Megajoule

[Leogunner]

54 minutes ago, Megajoule said:

Oh, and I thought of something today I wanted to make clear.  This is in no way personal, I have nothing against you, and your proposal is not significantly worse than all the other half-baked ideas for new powers and ATs I've seen posted here.  You just happened to be the (un)lucky one I decided to make an (extended) example of. 😕

Wow, the condescension.

 

Do you really want to get into that?  Do you really want to drag in more people (like me) into it? 

Edited October 21, 2019 by Leogunner

[Steampunkette]

3 hours ago, MetaVileTerror said:

And all of that work?  

 

Is.

Absolutely.

Worth.

It.

Oh, no doubt!

 

I wholeheartedly and earnestly believe it's worth it.

 

I'm just saying it's not the Easiest. It's not the Fastest. It's not the Best. It's time consuming and grueling for artists and designers...

 

It's worth it... but hooooly crap is it intensive.

[Puma]

12 hours ago, Steampunkette said:

Making new missions is the cheapest 'cause you've got a ton of people willing to write endless stories just for the sake of seeing their work become a part of the game they love. Taking AE Arcs that the playerbase has reviewed and tying them to in-world contacts and mission doors takes a lot less effort than building a powerset.

 

A powerset needs:

Data Entry for Each Power Individually (Which is not copy-paste)

UI Changes to accomodate the new powerset in the appropriate archetype lists

Icons and Descriptions

Animations

FX 

Balance Passes

Have you ever actually looked at the coding a new mission requires and how they need to be written? I have. It's incredibly complictated, and NOTHING like AE mission  creation. There's a REASON the devs on the secret server were able to create multiple new powersets and yet could only make a single new mission arc that, for a LONG time, had to be launched as a trial.  Granted they've come a long way which is why we're starting to get new arcs finally, and that trial has been converted into a new TF, but creating new arcs is VERY hard.  And unless you expect all new content to only use existing NPCs, you have similar problems stated above, but ALSO the difficulty of the mission mechanics, which are a mess.   Trust me when I say that this is an incorrect assumption.

Edited October 22, 2019 by Puma

[Steampunkette]

Back when the Architect launched it was described as being the same system used to create in-game arcs with an interface that made things easier.

 

In fact there was distinct mention by the devs that it would make content generation easier on -them- because they didn't have an interface before the ME was being constructed.

 

So while I don't doubt that the mission mechanics are really awkward and hard, I think I'll trust the Live Devs that it'll be a lot easier going forward. Especially since two AE Arcs created by a community member now exist in the game world.

[Puma]

8 hours ago, Steampunkette said:

Back when the Architect launched it was described as being the same system used to create in-game arcs with an interface that made things easier.

 

In fact there was distinct mention by the devs that it would make content generation easier on -them- because they didn't have an interface before the ME was being constructed.

 

So while I don't doubt that the mission mechanics are really awkward and hard, I think I'll trust the Live Devs that it'll be a lot easier going forward. Especially since two AE Arcs created by a community member now exist in the game world.

Well, since I specifically know and briefly helped someone who was trying to help the devs come up with an easier way to create missions, and know for a fact that it's not like the AE, and it's a spaghetti code that is a mess, I'll just tell you that you're wrong.  

Again, if you need evidence, look at what the devs were able to develop while the game was shut down and what they weren't. You had an entire -archetype- created (sentinels), an entirely new powerset developed (Savage Melee), a new power pool set (Force of will), several unfinished sets finished off and introduced (Rad armor, rad plant and time manip for blasters, etc.), and several other sets in development but unreleased. During that same period you had just one trial created that had to be launched from the LFG window and only recently was transformed into a TF with a contact, and only even more recently exactly two new contacts with arcs. 

   

This was not due to lack of interest in furthering content, nor to a lack of skilled writers with arcs. It does look like they've started making breakthroughs.  The point, though, is that it's not "easier" to do good story and contact content than it is to do good power development.  In fact, I would argue it's actually at LEAST as difficult, if not more.  

Want to get a good guage of how hard it will be, even aside from the programming? Go do a poll about what people think should happen with The Coming Storm.  What you'll find is MASSIVE disagreement about the dircection it should take and where the story should go, and PASSIONATE disagreement.  

 

Far more than you'll find disagreement on whether auto-powers should be capped at 9% or whether tankers should get any sort of pets.  

Edited October 22, 2019 by Puma

[Megajoule]

Force of Will and Savage Melee were both "unfinished", not "new".

[Puma]

1 hour ago, Megajoule said:

Force of Will and Savage Melee were both "unfinished", not "new".

Savage Melee was not "unfinished".  It was barely started...basically just a concept  if I recall, with a couple of animations done.  The entire set was worked and reworked, including how frenxy worked, etc. Force of Will and a few other power pools  sets were conceptualized but missing animations and power specifics.  That's entirely my point.  They were much more easily able to adjust/adapt/create powersets than they were to create mission arcs and contacts. 

Now with the increased resources that the server being public brings, hopefully both are going to be easier. But claiming "Making new missions is the cheapest 'cause you've got a ton of people willing to write endless stories just for the sake of seeing their work become a part of the game they love" is simplistic and ignores all of the complex system work that goes into mission creation.  It also, of course, ignores that this very thread (not to mention the one that Steampunkette started as a rip  off of this thread) is evidence that there are ALSO a ton of people willing to work endlessly on powerset concepts just for the sake of seeing their work and ideas become part of the game. Which also reminds me...

You said "Yes, you can half-ass a (potentially) broken, imbalanced, untested powersets much quicker than the timetable I gave."  I can't name a single power set in the game  that hasn't gone through extensive testing.  Hell, people who helped test Savage Melee saw iterations change drastically with its powers, and it's still being rebalanced.  Which is not surprising, considering even on live Devs were constantly adjusting long standing sets to refine them.  Your weird attitude that anything new is going to be rushed and unbalanced seems entirely unsupported by experience.  We do have a couple of sets that I think are overpowered: Bio, Rad Armor, and arguably Titan Weapons.  But two of those were unbalanced on live, and were basically "pay to win" sets.  And Titan Weapons is overpowered, but has a REALLY long investment time to get there, and a penalty just annoying enough to it to make many hate it, which is why we dont see Titan Weapons on every team.   

Edited October 23, 2019 by Puma